1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to identifying information and more particularly relates to identifying time-base information with historical events.
2. Description of the Related Art
Information systems such as data processing systems, e-mail systems, voicemail systems, and the like are generating increasing amounts of information. This information is typically stored so that it can be referenced in the future.
The large volume of such information that is stored often makes it difficult to find desired information. As a result, information systems often include sortable and searchable fields when storing data. For example, a digitized invoice may be searchable by payee, account, and date of receipt. Similarly, email and voicemail messages may be searchable by sender and/or topic. Desired information may be retrieved by searching for attributes in the searchable fields.
The information is often time-based, with a time of creation and/or receipt. For example, backups of data on a data processing system may be organized by the date and time of creation. Alternatively, information that is received as paper copies such as invoices may also be digitized and sortable by date of receipt. Time-based information is particularly useful when there are many instances of information that share other search criteria. For example, an information system may search for a particular backup data instance using a date of creation.
Unfortunately, it is often difficult to associate the time-based information with the information that is sought. For example, a user may have forgotten the date that important information was backed up. As a result, the user may be forced to review a number of backup copies in order to find and retrieve the important information.